As usual, a well-trained Western army has gone through a fierce-looking but virtually untrained force of African rebels like a hot knife through butter.

Two weeks ago, the northern half of Mali was under the control of Islamist militants, who were starting to advance on the south. So France decided to send troops and combat aircraft to its former colony. Today, every town in the north of Mali is under French control, and the surviving rebels have fled into the desert.

But most of them did survive: After losing a couple of major clashes in the first days of the French drive northwards, the Islamist forces simply abandoned the main towns as soon as the French forces came near.

It’s not surprising that the French military intervention was an instant success. The Islamist rebels, like most African paramilitaries (and quite a few African armies), did not know even basic combat drills that every infantry soldier in a Western army has practised until they are second nature. But now come three tasks that are considerably more difficult.

The first is to deploy an African Union-backed military force to take over from the French. You can’t hand the recaptured towns back to Mali’s army, which is so incompetent and rotted by politics that it would promptly lose them back to the militants.

This force, dubbed the International Support Mission to Mali, has the unanimous blessing of the United Nations Security Council. International donors met in Ethiopia on Tuesday and pledged $455 million to pay for it. Mali’s many neighbours have already identified the units they are going to send.

Once African troops replace the French, the next task is to rebuild the democratic government of Mali, which was destroyed by a military coup last March. The interim president, Dioncounda Traore, says he wants to hold elections in July, but behind the scenes the greedy young officers who staged the coup hold the real power. They will have to be sent back to their barracks before elections take place, and that will not be easy.

The third task is to win the very different kind of war that starts in Mali now. The militants, who have scattered across the vast deserts of northern Mali, will launch raids, bomb attacks and assassinations. Countries can survive for decades with that kind of low-intensity war, but the only way to shrink it to a manageable level is to make a political deal. This is not impossible in Mali because the Islamist fanatics hijacked the revolution from their former allies, the Tuareg separatists. Most of the people in the north are Tuaregs, desert-dwelling people of Berber stock and nomadic heritage who are ethnically, culturally and linguistically distinct from the black African majority in southern Mali. Many of them support the separatist movement, but few share the extreme religious views of the Islamist militants.

The two groups made an alliance to drive the Malian army out of the north, but the Islamists then turned on their allies and seized absolute power for themselves. Their harsh rule was resented by most people, so it should be possible to isolate the Islamists if the Malian government is willing to make a deal that gets the Tuareg separatists on its side. They won’t get independence, but they would probably settle for a large degree of autonomy. It will be hard to get a new Malian government that is elected almost entirely by the votes of southerners (90% of the population) to make that concession, but the alternative is a long, draining guerrilla war.

Was the French military intervention necessary? Yes, in the view of the United Nations, the African Union and most Malians. Was it a success? That remains to be seen.

— Gwynne Dyer is an independent journalist whose articles are published in 45 countries.